


Fated Pairs

by IchiBri



Series: The Heart Adventures [1]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Fluff, M/M, Not Canon Compliant, aliens expose their love, canonverse, fluff and cuteness, so do their hearts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-10
Updated: 2017-07-10
Packaged: 2018-11-30 10:07:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,059
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11461383
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IchiBri/pseuds/IchiBri
Summary: Thrown onto an alien planet, Shiro and Keith find their hearts.





	Fated Pairs

**Author's Note:**

> Birthday gift for Katsuu of our sheith heart au. Consider this a kind of prologue/explanation of how they get their hearts before we get into separate little oneshots for this au.

“…”

Static buzzed through Shiro’s helmet as he blearily blinked open heavy eyelids.  The world slowly came into clarity with each soft breath and fluttering of lashes.  But the lush blue foliage and fluffy shrubbery which greeted him had Shiro bolting upright.

His muscles protested.  He groaned at the tightness in his shoulders and the pounding ache in his hip.

“…ro…”

“Keith?” he groggily asked, his voice rough and gravelly.

“Shiro.”

The relief he heard in Keith’s voice had Shiro blinking his eyes shut.  He signed a shallow breath before leaning back until his head hit the soft grass beneath him.

“Where are you?  Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.  Sore, but fine.”  His eyes opened to a sky of swirling purples and pinks.  Specks of gold dotted the soft, almost pastel colors like stars in a night sky.

“You’re not hurt, are you?”

“About as hurt as the average person after being ejected from a flying space cat thrown through an unstable portal.”

“Funny,” Keith said, but there was no humor in his tone.  “Where are you?”

A hum rumbled through Shiro’s chest and carried over the communications link.  He propped himself up on his elbows and searched the area for any distinguishable features.  Bluish-tinted grass stretched for as far as his eyes could see, interrupted only by patches of teal shrubs with brightly striped berries growing from their branches.  “I’m south of a really tall tree shaped like a _y_.”

A moment of staticky breaths over the coms filled Shiro’s ears before Keith said, “I think I see it.  Just stay put.  I’ll come to you.”

Shiro hummed as he let his weight fall back to the ground, but the sound came out as a low groan.

“Oh, and uh, Shiro?”

“Yeah?”

“Do you, uh, have a heart?”

Shiro’s brow furrowed.  His head tipped forward to stare at his chest as he consciously tried to determine if he was breathing, and thus his heart was beating.  “Yes?” he hesitantly answered.

“No, I mean, an actual heart – a physical heart.”

Shiro’s lips pursed into a sideways pout.  Was his heart not a physical organ?  “Keith, did you hit your head?  I know you passed human biology with flying colors, so what’s going on?”

“A heart, Shiro.  Look around you.  Do you see a heart?”

“Keith, if this is…” Shiro trailed off as he pushed himself into a sitting position.  Carefully, he brushed aside the grass, finding the blades to be oddly pliant beneath his touch, almost like the colorful pipe cleaners used in kindergarten crafts.  “I don’t see a–” but his words died in his throat when his gloved fingers poked something soft and squishy.

A high-pitched yet nearly inaudible squeak sounded from the small… thing.  Shiro shifted to his knees and bent lower to get a better look.  He slowly reached out, gently sweeping the grass blades to the side.

Its body softly glowed with a steady, rosy gleam that pulsed from its center and rippled outwards like a pebble tossed in a lake.  It scrambled to stand on tiny legs but stumbled in its haste.  As the cartoonish, anatomically incorrect heart fell and rolled, a quiet breath passed over the coms.

“Ow.”

“Keith?” Shiro cupped his hands in a wall around the struggling heart to keep it from running away as he jerked his head to the right.  In the distance, he spotted the red and white paladin armor.  “What happened?  Are you okay?” his words rushed out.

“I don’t know.  It felt like… like a pin prick.”  A moment of silence passed before he asked, “Did you find the heart?”

“Yeah.”  Gently, Shiro coaxed his fingers beneath the heart.  As he scooped the little pulsing being into his palm, its warmth seeped through his glove.  “Where’d it come from?” he wondered aloud, watching as it turned in his grasp to stare up at him.

Shiro met its gaze.  His head tilted to the side as his eyes narrowed.  He swore the little, yet fierce gaze of the heart felt so familiar.  The grays of its irises were tinted blue, and if he didn’t know any better, he’d say they were quite reminiscent of a certain red paladin.

“Keith, do you have a heart?”

The crunch of footsteps over grass drew nearer.  And when Keith answered, Shiro heard his voice without the static.  “I have a heart, but… I think it might be yours.”

Shiro cupped a hand behind the heart as he clutched it close to his chest.  He stood as Keith stepped closer and came to a stop by his side.

For a moment, they both let their eyes sweep over the other, checking for torn armor and broken skin.  Shiro’s gaze traveled upward, over the red Voltron _V_ on Keith’s chest to the soft pout of his lips.  Higher still, Shiro found Keith’s eyes flicking over his own body – up his legs, his arms, his torso – until they met Shiro’s gaze.

As Keith’s eyes slightly widened, the heart in Shiro’s hand pulsed quicker with a deeper red than before.  Shiro’s gaze tipped lower to stare at the heart trying to stand in his palm.  And when he looked back up at Keith, he found Keith had done the same.

Keith’s eyes slowly rose to meet Shiro’s once more.  There was a new wonder swirling in their depths as his lips parted in awe.  Without a word, Keith closed the short distance between them in a single step.

Cupping the heart to his chestplate, Keith reached out with his other hand.  His eyes flicked down to Shiro’s left breast before meeting Shiro’s gaze again, a silent ask for permission.  He waited for a slow blink of eyes and a slight nod of the head before Keith pressed his palm flat against Shiro’s black underarmor, just below the breastplate.

His hand inched upward, fingers barely able to wiggle beneath the armor.  With each of Shiro’s breaths, Keith felt his knuckles pushed against the breastplate with the rise of Shiro’s chest.  Once over where he knew the heart to be, he pressed his hand further against Shiro.

But the faint beats of the heart he expected to feel were oddly missing.  His eyes closed as he focused on the base of his fingers and pressed harder into Shiro’s chest.  He repositioned his hand over and over, but he couldn’t find the pounding of Shiro’s heart.

Except maybe he did.  Keith opened his eyes and glanced down at the heart sitting quietly in his other palm, the heart’s tiny hands holding tight to his thumb.  It gazed over his thumb at him, and Keith watched the pulsing warmth of its color quicken.

He withdrew his hand from beneath Shiro’s armor.  Curiously, his eyes flicked to Shiro’s face as he gently poked the heart’s right lobe.

A quiet gasp escaped Shiro as he blinked down at his chest.  It was faint, but he felt a finger press against his skin.

“Do that again,” Shiro said.

Keith complied, only this time he gently rubbed the heart’s smooth, velvety skin.  When his finger brushed over a little purplish bruise, the heart’s eyes fell shut.  It leaned into Keith’s touch as a quiet purr sounded from it.

Shiro sucked in a stuttering breath at the blossoming of warmth in his chest.  It spread like a droplet of dye in water, seeping throughout his entire body until his knees grew weak.

“Keith, sto–”

“Shiro?  Keith?  Are you guys there?”

Shiro inhaled a steady breath when Keith’s finger paused in its caressing.  “We’re here,” he said.

Lance’s voice sounded over the coms.  “Where are you guys?  Pidge and I are by your lions.”

“We’re in the middle of nowhere.  I’ll send you our coordinates, so if one of you could pick us up, that’d be great.”

“Gotcha.  Pidge can babysit the lions,” Lance said, and it was followed by a not-so-mysterious thud and a cry of _Ow!_

“I’ll be right there,” Pidge emphasized.

“Thanks, and we, uh, kind of have a situation on our hands too,” Shiro looked down at the heart in his hand.  Finally settled down, it sat on his palm with its arms crossed and its legs kicking at his fingers.

“What kind of situation?” Pidge asked.

“A fighting kind?  A saving the universe kind?  A kind you’d need the team’s sharpshooter for?”

“No, Lance,” Keith cut in.  “It’s a… a…” His eyes flicked to the heart curled up on his hand.  How could he explain he had Shiro’s heart using the base of his fingers as a pillow?

“You’d need to see it to believe it,” Shiro said.  “Is the ship nearby?  Because we might need Coran’s and Allura’s help.  Hopefully, they’ll know what’s going on.”

 

“Well, I’ll be a weblum’s uncle,” Coran said as he stared at the heart Keith held.  “I’ve heard tales of the Psupherians but never dreamt they were true.”

“Psu… pherians?” Keith parroted with an arched eyebrow.

Shiro cupped his hands around the other heart on the table as it once again tried to run away.  “What are they?” he asked.

Hunk and Lance peered over Shiro’s hand wall.  “It’s so cute,” Hunk quietly cooed as he waved a finger at the heart.

The heart jumped for Hunk’s finger, grabbing on and refusing to let go.

“Careful, Hunk, it might bite.  It is Keith’s after all,” Lance said, yet he proceeded to poke at it.

“Can you not?” Keith sent a weak glare in the other’s direction as a faint, feathering sensation tingled his sternum.

“Guys, the Psupherians,” Shiro repeated with more force.  He plucked the heart off of Hunk’s finger and cupped it in his own hand.  But the heart scrambled like a bug, crawling and climbing up Shiro’s arm only to be put back in the palm before it reached the shoulder.  “What are they?”

“Well, I don’t really know.  No one does,” Coran admitted.  He held his hand out to Shiro’s heart, and the little heart stared at it before then looking up at Keith.  At Keith’s soft smile and slight nod, the heart hopped from his hand to Coran’s.  “Some stories say they’re nomads who travel the universe while others compare them to monsters long since extinct.”

“So, they did this?” Keith nodded toward the heart.

“Supposedly,” Coran raised the heart to eye level to look at it from all angles, “they steal hearts and eat them.”

A sharp gasp echoed off the walls of the ship, and everyone’s eyes turned to Hunk.  “But they’re so cute!”

“I said supposedly,” Coran gently passed the heart back to Keith.  “Other legends say they’re tricksters who swap the hearts of fated pairs.”

Shiro and Keith glanced at each other, both their eyes widening before softening at their edges.  The hearts in their hands stilled as their pulsing colors quickened and deepened.  A tiny squeak sounded from Shiro’s heart in Keith’s hand, and Keith’s heart squeaked back.  The high-pitched chirps filled the room as if a dozen birds had been released.

“I feel like we’re intruding on a moment,” Lance stage-whispered.

Keith’s heart scrambled up Shiro’s arm faster than Shiro could catch it.  It ran over his shoulder and grabbed onto the short, shaved hair as it passed over Shiro’s neck.  On Shiro’s right shoulder, it stopped.  It reached its little arms out and squeaked at the other heart.

Keith quietly chuckled as he stepped closer to Shiro.  He raised his hand to Shiro’s shoulder, and Shiro’s heart hopped over.

The two hearts sat down, letting their legs dangle as they clasped hands.

“It’s probably not a good time to ask, but can I dissect them?”

“Pidge, no!” the other paladins said in near perfect unison.

“I’m afraid not,” Coran shook his head.  “For if the hearts die, so will Shiro and Keith.”

A thick silence fell over the room until Shiro asked, “Is there any way to fix this?”

“I’m afraid I don’t know.  Very little is known about the Psupherians, but I’ll ask around.  For now, we need to protect those little guys.”

Keith reached his hand up to gently stroke the lobes of both hearts in turn.  He smiled at the sigh it elicited from Shiro.  “How bad can it be?  It’ll be like taking care of puppies.”

“And who doesn’t love puppies?” Hunk said.

“Right!” Keith agreed.  “Who doesn’t love puppies?”

**Author's Note:**

> Find me @ichibri on tumblr and twitter


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